Opinion of the Court. PETROWSKI ET AL. v. HAWKEYE-SECURITY CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT. No. 469. Argued March 7, 1956.-Decided March 26, 1956. The District Court had jurisdiction of the subject matter in this case; and respondent, by its stipulation, waived any right to assert a lack of personal jurisdiction over it. Pp. 495-496. 226 F. 2d 126, reversed and remanded. Richard P. Tinkham, Jr. argued the cause and filed a brief for petitioners. Victor M. Harding argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Herbert C. Hirschboeck. PER CURIAM. Respondent, Hawkeye-Security Insurance Company, filed a motion to quash the return of service of summons on the grounds that the District Court acquired no personal jurisdiction over it and that the power of attorney I which it had filed with the Commissioner of Motor Vehicles of the State of Wisconsin did not authorize him to accept service of process for it in this case. After this motion was denied, respondent filed its answer to the complaint in which it again pressed its claim that the District Court lacked personal jurisdiction over it. Subsequently, however, respondent filed (1) a motion to amend its answer and to interplead; (2) a counterclaim; (3) a stipulation and order adding a party-plaintiff and amending the complaint and answer; and (4) a stipulation that judgment be entered against the alleged insured in favor of the additional party-plaintiff. The latter 350 U.S. Opinion of the Court. stipulation included the following provision, together with others consistent with it and confirmatory of its purpose: "1. That each of the parties to this stipulation voluntarily submits to the jurisdiction of the above entitled Court without service of process herein, the same as if personal service had been obtained by each against the other." Following a trial on the merits, judgment was entered against respondent, but the Court of Appeals, with one judge dissenting, reversed on the ground that respondent's motion to quash should have been granted. 226 F.2d 126. Upon examination of the record and the law, we conclude that the District Court had jurisdiction of the subject matter and that respondent, by its stipulation, waived any right to assert a lack of personal jurisdiction over it. We, therefore, reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to it for further proceedings. Reversed and remanded. Syllabus. PENNSYLVANIA v. NELSON. CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA, WESTERN DISTRICT. No. 10. Argued November 15-16, 1955.-Decided April 2, 1956. The Smith Act, as amended, 18 U. S. C. § 2385, which prohibits the knowing advocacy of the overthrow of the Government of the United States by force and violence, supersedes the enforceability of the Pennsylvania Sedition Act, which proscribes the same conduct. Pp. 498-510. 1. The scheme of federal regulation is so pervasive as to make reasonable the inference that the Congress left no room for the States to supplement it. Pp. 502–504. 2. The federal statutes touch a field in which the federal interest is so dominant that the federal system must be assumed to preclude enforcement of state laws on the same subject. Pp. 504-505. 3. Enforcement of state sedition acts presents a serious danger of conflict with the administration of the federal program. Pp. 505-510. 377 Pa. 58, 104 A. 2d 133, affirmed. Frank F. Truscott, Special Deputy Attorney General of Pennsylvania, and Harry F. Stambaugh argued the cause for petitioner. With them on the brief were Frank P. Lawley, Jr., Deputy Attorney General, and Albert A. Fiok. Herbert S. Thatcher argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Victor Rabinowitz. By special leave of Court, Charles F. Barber argued the cause for the United States, and Louis C. Wyman, Attorney General, for the State of New Hampshire, as amici curiae, urging reversal. On the brief with Mr. Barber were Solicitor General Sobeloff, Assistant Attorney General Tompkins, Harold D. Koffsky and Philip R. Monahan. Mr. Wyman also filed a brief. Opinion of the Court. 350 U.S. Briefs of amici curiae urging reversal were filed by George Fingold, Attorney General, and Lowell S. Nicholson, Samuel H. Cohen and Fred L. True, Jr., Assistant Attorneys General, for the State of Massachusetts, and Ralph B. Gregg for the American Legion. Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed by Osmond K. Fraenkel and Herbert Monte Levy for the American Civil Liberties Union, Walter C. Longstreth, Allen S. Olmsted, 2d and William Allen Rahill for the Civil Liberties Committee of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, and Frank J. Donner, Royal W. France, Arthur Kinoy and Marshall Perlin for Feldman et al. MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WARREN delivered the opinion of the Court. The respondent Steve Nelson, an acknowledged member of the Communist Party, was convicted in the Court of Quarter Sessions of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, of a violation of the Pennsylvania Sedition Act1 and sentenced to imprisonment for twenty years and to a fine of $10,000 and to costs of prosecution in the sum of $13,000. The Superior Court affirmed the conviction. 172 Pa. Super. 125, 92 A. 2d 431. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, recognizing but not reaching many alleged serious trial errors and conduct of the trial court infringing upon respondent's right to due process of law, decided 2 1 Pa. Penal Code § 207, 18 Purdon's Pa. Stat. Ann. § 4207. The text of the statute is set out in an Appendix to this opinion, post, p. 510. 2 The Supreme Court also did not have to reach the question of the constitutionality of subdivision (c) of the Pennsylvania Act, the basis of four counts of the twelve-count indictment, which punishes utterances "or conduct [intended to] incite or encourage any person to commit any overt act with a view to bringing the Government of this State or of the United States into hatred or contempt." Cf. Winters v. New York, 333 U. S. 507. This provision is strangely 497 Opinion of the Court. the case on the narrow issue of supersession of the state law by the Federal Smith Act. In its opinion, the court stated: "And, while the Pennsylvania statute proscribes sedition against either the Government of the United States or the Government of Pennsylvania, it is only alleged sedition against the United States with which the instant case is concerned. Out of all the voluminous testimony, we have not found, nor has anyone pointed to, a single word indicating a seditious act or even utterance directed against the Government of Pennsylvania." 4 The precise holding of the court, and all that is before us for review, is that the Smith Act of 1940,5 as amended in 1948, which prohibits the knowing advocacy of the overthrow of the Government of the United States by force and violence, supersedes the enforceability of the Pennsylvania Sedition Act which proscribes the same conduct. Many State Attorneys General and the Solicitor General of the United States appeared as amici curiae for petitioner, and several briefs were filed on behalf of the respondent. Because of the important question of federal-state relationship involved, we granted certiorari. 348 U. S. 814. reminiscent of the Sedition Act of 1798, 1 Stat. 596, which punished utterances made "with intent to defame the . government, or either house of the . . . Congress, or the . . . President, or to bring them. . . into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them. . . the hatred of the good people of the United States 3 377 Pa. 58, 104 A. 2d 133. * 377 Pa., at 69, 104 A. 2d, at 139. 554 Stat. 670. 18 U. S. C. § 2385. The text of the statute is set out in an Appendix to this opinion, post, p. 511. (Another part of the Smith Act, punishing the advocacy of mutiny, is now 18 U. S. C. § 2387.) |